AKIRA (1988)

AKIRA (1988)

IMDb - 81%

81%

Metacritic - 76%

76%

Rotten Tomatoes - 87%

87%

Summary

AKIRA is a 1988 Japanese epic animated science fiction thriller film directed by Katsuhiro Otomo, written by Otomo and Izo Hashimoto, and featuring the voices of Mitsuo Iwata, Nozomu Sasaki, Mami Koyama, and Taro Ishida. The screenplay is based on Otomo's manga of the same name, focusing mainly on the first half of the story. The film depicts a dystopian version of Tokyo in the year 2019, with cyberpunk tones. The plot focuses on teenage biker Tetsuo Shima and his psychic powers, and the leader of his biker gang, Shotaro Kaneda. Kaneda tries to prevent Tetsuo from releasing the imprisoned psychic Akira. While most of the character designs and settings were adapted from the original 2182-page manga epic, the restructured plot of the movie differs considerably from the print version, pruning much of the last half of the manga. The film has maintained a large following as a cult film since its theatrical release, and is widely considered to be a landmark in Japanese animation.